


Debris

by harcourt



Series: Stark Business Empire [4]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Aftermath, Alternate Universe - Slavery, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Sharing a Bed, past trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-29
Updated: 2015-05-29
Packaged: 2018-04-01 21:09:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,067
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4034677
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/harcourt/pseuds/harcourt
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the wake of Clint's escape attempt, everyone's a little broken, and Steve's not sure what to do about it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Debris

For days, everything is too quiet. Steve could swear that Happy's almost bored of the peace, striking up increasingly pointless small talk, everything from sports updates neither of them care about to gossip about starlets neither of them could really pick out of a crowd, unless they happen to be starlets who also show up at the tower.

Which none of them have been. Tony's aggressive energy's turned more into a sulky depression, and instead of explosives and guests at all hours, there’s just a lot of moody tinkering, parts and schematics slowly spreading over most surfaces, from the kitchen counters to the coffee table. There's a row of screws lined up on top of the television's narrow top, in decreasing size, carefully set at the same angle, parallel to each other, and at forty five degrees to the edge of the TV. Other than the last, that someone keeps turning out of sync, a bit at a time. 

That minor prank is getting to Tony, to the point that he's stopped fixing it and is ignoring the slow rotation as he fiddles with one bunch of screens and wires and data boards, then wanders to the next, working in an uneven circuit around the place. Steve would suspect Clint--that combination of spite and humor seems like him--except that Clint's been even more quiet than Tony, keeping to his cubicle across the slave hall, and leaving it only under order. A shadow at Phil's heels, shoulders hunching at the door to the training room, but following obediently.

Phil's not doing much with him. Whatever they'd been working on has been replaced by the both of them sitting silently and listening to records, which Steve discovers because the machine is his and neither Phil nor Clint really know how to get the fussy thing to play without the sound going wobbly.

"If you scratch my records," he threatens, as the needle lowers and soft piano music comes on over the speakers. It gets a low polite laugh and a smile out of Phil, but Clint doesn't react. Just stays where he is, feet pulled up on the windowseat and head turned towards the glass, looking out, face shielded by a bent arm, elbow on his knee. Steve knows him well enough now to recognize it as an evasive, defensive posture. Clint subtly blocking his face from view, or the room from his sight. Steve's not sure which. Maybe both. 

"Anything else, sir?" 

Phil glances at him, then back to Clint. Waves his dismissal in a way he usually wouldn't, with Steve, then brings his hand back to his face, fingers curled into a loose fist and knuckled thoughtfully against his chin. Steve hasn't seen him like that, other than when Tony's nearly killed himself. He's not sure how to read it, in this situation.

Or how to read Clint, really, because the only time he bothers to make contact with anyone, on his own, is the nights when he pads across the hall to Steve and Bruce's side and slips into one of their beds, to share sleeping space and nothing else. 

"Happens all the time," Bruce murmurs, voice low the way it had been when Steve was new, and Bruce had found his wariness both amusing and ridiculous, but had humored it anyway, talking softly through their dividing wall. Now, it's to keep their conversation from drifting across to Clint's side of the hall. "You should come on some conferences. See what happens on those." 

Bruce's voice has that low dark tone that means things are hiding under the joke, but Steve laughs because he knows he's supposed to. Because everything with Bruce is indirect and at angles and coming at them straight will make him wall up. Even if what's hiding is just more funny stories. It's hard to guess, and that makes it hard to do anything but follow Bruce's cues.

"At training houses too," Bruce goes on, and there's a thump-thump against the wall, too dull and deep to be a ball. Maybe Bruce's chair knocking, if he's still working and shifting around. Steve can't see a light, but Bruce could easily be hunched over the glow of a tablet.

"You're going to go blind," Steve comments, guessing, and hears Bruce snort right before something clicks and the darkness outside Steve's half wall picks up a golden glow.

"There. Happy?"

Steve shifts, so he can watch the shadow flicker of Bruce moving. Lifting an arm past the light to tap at his screen every so often, or flicking his wrist to scroll through pages of notes. "Not so much in the Army," Steve comments, going back to the conversation, and meaning the bed sharing. 

"Yeah, you free men are very proud," Bruce says, and there's the dull shuffle-thump of him knocking a sheaf of paper against his desk to straighten the pages. "Tell him to stop, or ask Phil to make him quit, if it bothers you."

Steve shifts again. Listens for movement from Clint's side of the room, but there's nothing. "It doesn't bother me," he says.

"Or you can send him over here. I don't need that much space, and who has time to sleep anyway?"

There's no point in Bruce trying to keep up with Tony, especially since Tony's just puttering out his guilt and not chasing any sort of deadline, but Steve doesn't say so or respond to the wry tone. Just repeats, "It doesn't bother me."

\-----

It does bother him, a little. Not because of lingering military culture or free man pride or whatever else Bruce might tease him with, but because Clint takes up most of the bed, squishing him up against the wall, until there's no space for Steve to arrange his limbs and he ends up throwing an arm over Clint just so he can straighten his elbow out.

Also because Clint comes slinking over in sweats and a sleeveless shirt that cuts in enough at the shoulders to bare the little circus tent tattooed on him. Dark, sharp triangles arranged into a distinct logo. It's very crisp for being as old as it's supposed to be, and as always, a little disquieting. Steve puts a finger to it, without really thinking, tracing lines he's sure have been touched up. Clint doesn't even twitch.

He's awake though, and Steve knows he feels the touch, because a second later he lets his breath out in a long sigh. Like he's trying to blow some kind of feeling out of his body. Steve remembers doing the same before parachute jumps, and after, when he thinks of Bucky and how he'd died.

"You okay?"

Clint jerks at that, then stills. Steve asks, in a whisper, "Are we not supposed to talk? Bruce has the whole thing down, but I've only lived here." And it's always been just him and Bruce in the tower, with occasional visitors usually treated to the spare room and the luxury of real privacy. He's not really sure what the rules are.

Clint doesn't answer, but his shoulders round as he curls in a little, arms pulled in close to hug himself around the middle. Steve's still touching him, fingertip touch turned into full-palm contact, resting lightly against Clint's back, near the logo but not covering it, a seam of fabric running under his thumb where the cloth of Clint's shirt turns to skin.

"That thing pretty?" Clint asks, after a while, and Steve takes his hand away.

It's not. Or at least, the idea of it and what it means and imagining how young Clint might have been ruins any appeal the design might have held on its own. Steve doesn't say so. Isn't sure if that's the answer Clint wants or if saying _it's not_ is the right thing to say about a mark permanently etched onto a man.

"You like the circus?" Clint goes on, sounding like Bruce. Dark edges hiding under the question, visible but indistinct enough that Steve's not sure where he's going with it. 

"I did," Steve says, "the time I went. It was alright. Lot of off duty guys there, so it wasn't really like being away. A lot of them were kind of," he considers. Goes with, "Rowdy."

"Like mercs, huh?" Clint chuckles, and right. Steve forgets sometimes how dangerous Clint is and the breadth of skills he's really trained in. What he might have done, between training house and Tony bringing him home.

"Not like mercs," Steve says. "Mostly like stupid kids."

Clint snorts. Steve's not sure at what, but it's derisive. His hand comes up, touches his face, then falls back to the mattress, where Clint has miles of space. "We had a bear," he says, then clarifies, "At the carnival." His hunch gets a little more pronounced. "It was an old fucking thing. Barely any teeth. And this one snaggly canine, like," Clint gestures, but it’s too close to his body and Steve can't see what the motion is. "It'd get all patchy sometimes. Fleas or something, I dunno. The thing stank like bear piss. Couldn't really walk too good anymore either. It just kind of slept and ate and shit all over the place, I guess."

Steve touches the back of Clint's head, just with his fingers, the way he's seen Pepper do, because he's not sure what, if anything, he should say, and he's seen Clint settle down, for Pepper. 

"If we were bad, we'd have to clean up after it. Fucking thing couldn't even be bothered to growl at us."

"My unit had a dog for a bit," Steve offers. "So many people were feeding that mutt, it wouldn't bark at anybody. Just begged, even from complete strangers."

"It was in shows," Clint goes on, without responding, "before. When it was a young, cool looking, impressive kind of bear. But it could balance on a ball, on just its front feet. And do this rolling kind of bear somersault." He sounds really unhappy. Too hollow for what the story is. "Jump through flaming hoops. Ride a unicycle and dance for bits of hamburger. Kiss people's cheeks for pictures. All that kind of stuff."

"Sounds like a clever bear."

"I never saw it do any of that. By the time I got there, it was just this bony, stinking thing, but sometimes they'd still dress it up in these stupid fucking get ups. Tutus and vests and little hats and shit. I guess visitors couldn't tell the difference and no one was really there for animal tricks anyway, you know? It was just this dumb mascot by then, but they'd lead it around by the neck anyway." Clint shifts around, but it doesn't make any more room for Steve. "Liven up sales days."

Steve drops his arm back over Clint. For a while, it's quiet, and Steve starts to think that Clint's asleep, but then he says, bitterly and into the dark,

"Had to get their money's worth, I guess. Since they'd paid for every damn second of that animal's life."

One of the small scars at the base of Clint's neck is visible, a dark mark, peering out just above the collar of his shirt. Steve has the urge to touch it, the way he had the tattoo, but he doesn't.

"The damn thing is probably dead by now."

"Probably."

Clint makes a low, meaningless noise in response. Just a soft _mm_ , with nothing behind it except maybe mild agreement. "I can do handstands on a ball," he says, after a bit and sounding final, like it's a conclusion. Like he's found the answer to something he's been thinking about. "But I'd probably look like an ass in costumes." Then he squirms, getting more comfortable, his back pressed even closer to Steve, and is silent, not brooding or fuming, but just empty and worn. Not reacting when Steve lets his forehead bump gently against the back of Clint's head and rests it there, even though he's breathing into Clint's hair and against the back of his neck.

It's dark over the half wall, no light flooding out from the next cubicle over, which means Bruce is asleep, or working away in the dark again, and hearing every word they're saying, but Steve doesn't say anything about it. Just wraps his arm a little tighter around Clint, for a second.


End file.
